Two: Living A Life of Courage
by Pavement Chaser
Summary: Sequal to A Life Worth Living. She new this wasn’t going to be easy...not by a long shot. But, they were in it now. The game had started and their journey had begun.


**A/N: Well, here we are again (for those of you who read the first story). And for those of you who didn't read the first story…I'm not going to make you read it. If you get confused you can go back and look things up but…I won't shun you if you don't. **

**Anyway, it's good to be back. These will be longer chapters and thus they will take longer to update. But the more positive feedback I get the more it spurs me on! **

**Well, enjoy the story and with further ado…**

Living A Life of Courage

Chapter 1: A journey begins

"Be careful." He said sternly with a fatherly attitude.

"I will." She nodded to him. "I won't be gone long. I know where mo…" she paused, sadness flashing in her amber eyes. "I know where mom kept everything." A small smile graced her lips.

"I'll be here when you get back."

She turned toward the well, her raven colored locks flowing behind her like black wind.

'All you do is jump,' she told herself reassuringly. And then…the shadows swallowed her.

The hanyou looked into the sky and sighed. Now he would wait for his daughter to come back.

000

Mimiko climbed out of the well with little difficulty thanks to the rope ladder her mother had put in long ago.

She had told herself she wasn't going back but she found she had to take one last trip. They were beginning a journey and they were bound to run into to trouble, people were bound to get hurt, and they were bound to run out of food. So, Mimiko took the liberty of stealing her own mother's idea and was stocking up on dry food that wouldn't go bad and plenty of first aid supplies.

She took giant steps to get to the house, as to make the trip as fast as possible.

She gave the doorknob a swift turn. Locked. So, Mimiko reached her hand above the doorframe and felt the cold metal of a spare key, like she had done so many times before.

With a steady twist of the handle she was in the house, the smell of home overwhelming her keen senses.

She stood for only a moment and let the memories come. For only one second she could see her mother at the sink doing dishes. Only for an instant did she wish with every bone in her body to go back. To go back to the way things used to be; to the time when her mother was alive and things were simple.

Her demon eyes shut slowly taking in her surroundings and she took a single breath and stored it in her memory so that in desperate times she could recall this place and all it's happy times; so she could recall the life she once led.

But that was all she allowed. One second. In the next her eyes were open and she darted up the stairs.

She knew what she was looking for; the question was where was it?

Mimiko found it on the top shelf of a closet after a few minutes of searching and with a thankful sigh she grabbed the straps of the friendly yellow backpack and pulled it down upon herself.

"First aid first." She spoke aloud to herself.

She set the bright yellow bag on the side of the bathtub with a clunk. Then with a swift movement she was facing the mirror, her molten eyes staring back at her.

Who was she?

She was Mimiko Higurashi but who was the girl in the mirror? Her hair was wavy from being wet but matted with grease on top. She hadn't showered in days but she wasn't dirty. It was just from lying on the floor of Sango and Miroku's hut, after recuperating from having the Shikon jewel break within her. Speaking of which, she still had blood smeared on her t-shirt. She looked like she'd been in a fight and lost.

'Guess I should get used to it. This is how I'm going to look everyday from now on.' She gave a disappointed 'humph' and then reached below the sink and pulled out two large bottles of shampoo. She wouldn't shower everyday but there was no reason not to be clean every once in a while.

She pulled back on the small handle and the mirror gave up her reflection. Inside the cabinet she pulled out a bag with an assortment of ointments including Neosporin. The hanyou dug up as much gauze as she could find which wasn't very much. It kind of concerned her.

Four boxes of band aids and a bottle of peroxide later, Mimiko was still worried that she was underestimating how much they would need on this trip.

She would have to make a stop at the drug store before going back.

000

Now in a clean pair of jeans and white t-shirt the small framed girl emptied the contents of each kitchen cabinet.

The somewhat obsessive compulsive side of Mimiko thrived as she laid the last chicken flavored ramen package on the pile along with the others. Twelve beef, ten vegetable, sixteen chicken, and three shrimp. Guess she was going to get food too.

She moved to the refrigerator and opened it with a puckered snap. Her head cocked to the side in confusion.

They refrigerator was fully stocked and with things she and her mother normally wouldn't eat. She was kind of surprised that everything was still good since she hadn't been home in over a week.

Trying not to pay attention to it she reached for the water bottles they always kept.

With an armful she turned and kicked the door shut, then set everything on the counter so that she could arrange everything to fit in the pack.

She was almost finished when she heard the front door open.

Panic set in as she grabbed everything and quickly snuck into a neighboring room.

The TV went on soon after. The news. Who did she know that would make themselves at home in her house, who would come home in the middle of the day, and who watched the news?

She peeked around the corner strictly out of curiosity to see Hojo reaching in the refrigerator for a bottle of water.

"I thought I had more of these." He said to no one but himself. He twisted off the cap and took a long swig before leaving the kitchen.

Mimiko had to get out of the house before he noticed she had been there. She'd been missing for nearly ten days. He'd want to know where she'd been.

She couldn't tell him that she'd been to the past, found her dad, and gotten caught up in what was basically magical warfare. He'd put her in a mental institution!

Quietly putting everything else in the bag, Mimiko kept looking over her shoulder into the living room to see Hojo sitting on the couch. Luckily his back was turned to her, leaving her free to go out the back like she had come in.

So, she did. She took a deep breath and started down the street to the drug store for supplies and more ramen. Unfortunately, she didn't hear what the news had to say before she left.

"Teenager, Mimiko Higurashi, is still missing in recent news." The Japanese reporter stated factually. "Investigators say she might have ran away after killing her own mother ten days ago. She is the only lead to the crime."

Hojo got up off the couch. He only had an hour for lunch so it was a smart idea to get his meal going.

"If anyone has seen the girl please contact the authorities immediately." And with that there was a picture of Mimiko pasted on the TV screen and then nothing more was said about the mystery of her disappearance.

Hojo shook his head to the news as he opened up the cabinet with all of his ramen, only to find it empty.

000

The entry bell rang as she stepped into the little drug store. The eyes of the middle aged woman running the checkout counter flew to the teenager.

Mimiko realized it was probably weird to see her in there when she should have been at school. She sighed and made a conscious decision to go fast and get out of there.

Her ebony hair flung around her face as her head whipped around looking for first aid and ramen in the small convenient store.

She spotted the colorful packages of dry food towards the back of the room and headed to them.

It was so quiet. Mimiko was the only shopper in the place and it made is eerily silent. There was no noise except for her own breathing and a small, travel sized TV the cashier had up at the front desk with her.

Mimiko dug around her pocket and brought out a wad of bills she had shoved in her jeans before leaving home. She had thirty bucks with her to get whatever she needed and that included more peroxide and gauze.

She set her backpack down realizing she was going to need a basket to get everything to the front desk without dropping anything.

She ambled by the checkout lady again and once more she stared at her like she carried some sort of infectious disease. She wasn't sure if it was because she looked like she hadn't showered in over a week or if she smelled as bad as she looked, or even if she had noticed her demon traits yet. Anyway, it made Mimiko extremely uncomfortable.

The girl slid her hand under the grips of the red basket on top of the tall pile by the front door. Unfortunately, when she walked away the whole stack came tumbling down behind her.

Rosy cheeked with embarrassment, she turned around immediately to pick them up. Her head whipped up, hair tumbling in her face, to see the unhappy look on the checkout lady's face. The woman gave a heavy sigh and then come out from behind her desk to help pick them up.

She got down on hands and knees and started stacking the little crimson baskets along with Mimiko.

The woman studied the girl. She was strange. She looked like she hadn't bathed in a month and she seemed jumpy; like she was scared of everything.

Mimiko mumbled a 'thanks a lot' under her breath, feeling inferior to the human considerate enough to give her a hand. Mimiko always felt inferior.

"Don't worry about it." The woman replied with no emotion. That's when Mimiko looked up and gave her a small smile, her eyes glimmering gold with the sunlight that illuminated the store.

The woman gasped at the sight. Not because she was afraid of Mimiko but because she had never seen such breathtaking eyes before and the fact that she was the girl they had been talking about on the news for the past week.

"You're her." She finally breathed.

Mimiko, now completely out of her element, jumped up knocking all of the baskets over again. She avoided confrontation at any cost even if it meant causing trouble. And even though she had no idea what 'you're her' meant she had a feeling things were going to escalate very quickly.

She doubled back to where her stash of food and her backpack were. With one hand she shoved everything down and literally threw two more bottles of peroxide in the back with as many other things she could swipe off of the shelves.

Mimiko heard the cashier get on the phone behind her.

"Yes, give me the Tokyo police…" she waited for merely seconds before she spoke again. "Yes, I believe I have a girl you've been looking for. Higurashi. Thank you…hai." The she hung up the phone.

Mimiko closed the flap on the bag and then tied it shut with nimble fingers. How did the woman know her name?

Creeped out enough as it was, Mimiko stood and ran. She jumped over all of the baskets in the doorway.

"Hey! You have to pay for that!"

The demon girl stepped back inside the door and threw three ten-dollar bills on the floor. "This should be more than enough to cover it." Then she left the woman standing amidst a sea of red baskets with nothing but the sound of her TV and the police cars that were now after Mimiko.

000

Hojo stood at the sink washing his plate from lunch.

He looked out of the window right in front of his face. It looked over the back yard. He could see the well house that Kagome was always so fond of and the swing he had helped her hang in the sacred tree when they were both teenagers.

Smiling to himself sadly, he let the carefree times he had with Kagome sneak to the front of his mind. He really did love her; and he loved Mimiko. Even though Kagome had to have been with a demon for Mimiko to exist, he didn't care.

Tears welled in his eyes thinking about it. If only Mimiko would come home.

Just then the sound of sirens drew his red-rimmed eyes back to the window…and there was Mimiko.

She looked terrible and she was fumbling over herself trying to carry the overloaded yellow knapsack she had.

He dropped the dishes. He ran to the door and before he could even breathe again he was in the well house with Mimiko.

She looked at him as he grabbed her wrist. She was climbing back down into the well.

Her eyes were wide with dread and she seemed to search for words.

"Hojo…I'm sorry." She tugged for her hand back but he wouldn't let her go. "Please Hojo…I need to go."

The sounds of police cars were coming closer.

"Mimi…where were you? Why didn't you come home?" His eyes were red with unshed tears again. "I know what the news said but I don't care…I know you didn't kill her." Mimiko stopped to listen. They thought that she killed Kagome?

"Please Mimi. Come back. You don't have to hide in his well house anymore. I'll take care of you." His grip became tighter making Mimiko wince.

There was a long silence before she heard the cars pull up.

"I can't Hojo. I'm sorry!" Then she pulled away and fell back into the well watching the pained expression on his face turn to confusion.

000

"Jeeze. Took you long enough!" Inuyasha bent over to take the bag from Mimiko. "Kami! Did you plan on taking care of an army?" The bag was much heavier than anything Kagome brought.

"No, but I don't want to go back anytime soon. I brought as much as I could fit in the bag." She swung herself over the top of the well and landed solidly on her feet. "I'm ready to go now though."

"Good. I think Miroku and Sango have everything under control in the village."

They two started back on the man made path to the village. Mimiko felt a terrible sense of excitement. They would leave tomorrow in search of the jewel but while she couldn't help but be excited, she also felt a little unnerved. She new this wasn't going to be easy. Not by a long shot.

But, they were in it now. The game had started and their journey had begun.


End file.
